


pretty baby stay

by flying_dream



Category: Produce 101 (TV), UP10TION, X1 (Korea Band)
Genre: Also yes that baby is Jinwoo, Don't come at me for that, M/M, Single Parents, They raise a baby together and they fall in Love, V brief cameos by X1 hyung line and a couple of UP10TION members, Weishin liiiives, Yes I was inspired to finish this after seeing the weishin selfies yday
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2020-08-07
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:40:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25773754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flying_dream/pseuds/flying_dream
Summary: It’s funny, isn’t it, how life can change in a matter of moments? One second, Jinhyuk was pulling open the door to his apartment, stifling the remnants of a yawn that lingered from his Sunday afternoon nap; the next, he found himself holding a baby he didn’t know existed until today, bags scattered around his feet.Or:Jinhyuk and Wooseok learn how to raise a child together. Somewhere along the way, they fall in love too.It happens like this.
Relationships: Kim Wooseok | Wooshin/Lee Jinhyuk
Comments: 26
Kudos: 99





	pretty baby stay

**Author's Note:**

> according to the word document that i wrote this in, i started this au on 13th september 2019. it is legit just short of a year since i wrote the first couple of hundred words, but then i saw the weishin selcas last night (thank you vicki!), opened it up and just... didn't stop writing. so here we are. this is unbetaed like all my things are, but i don't see myself editing this extensively in the future so i figured i might as well return to this tag and feed it a little. we don't have enough english weishin fics lmao
> 
> warning/disclaimers: since jinwoo is a baby here, there are passing references and mentions of stuff like baby vomit. just thought i should let you know since vomit can make people uncomfy sometimes. also the goeun mentioned here is an OC and not related to the goeun from pd48 in any way whatsoever.
> 
> title inspired by 'can't take my eyes off you' by frankie valli

**PRETTY BABY STAY**

The baby looks like any other baby in the world. Cherub cheeks, a dinky nose, a wobbly little chin that’s wet with drool. Two tiny fists for hands. Big almond eyes gaze up at him inquisitively, but the baby is otherwise unaware of how his life has just been completely upheaved around him.

_The baby._

Jinhyuk supposes he should stop calling him that. _The_ baby, that is. His name is Jinwoo. Lee Jinwoo. And he’s not just _the_ baby, or even _a_ baby – but _his_ baby. Jinhyuk’s.

It’s funny, isn’t it, how life can change in a matter of moments? One second, Jinhyuk was pulling open the door to his apartment, stifling the remnants of a yawn that lingered from his Sunday afternoon nap; the next, he found himself holding a baby he didn’t know existed until today, bags scattered around his feet.

Okay, maybe that was an exaggeration. It wasn’t like Park Goeun just dumped the baby – _Jinwoo_ – into his arms and then scarpered. They had a conversation first, one where she explained that their impromptu hook-up at her going away party the previous year had landed them with a son and that, after three months of attempting to tap into her mothering instincts, she concluded that she wasn’t fit for the job. So she briefly returned to Seoul, baby and bags in tow, to see whether his father was willing to step up instead.

Never mind the fact that Jinhyuk knew absolutely _nothing_ about any of this. Hell, he barely even remembers the sex itself, aside from Goeun pulling him into the toilets at the office and Jinhyuk’s shirt getting torn in the process. It’s a blur in his mind that his work colleagues occasionally tease him about when the office gossip well is running particularly dry.

But now he has a baby on his lap. Goeun is long gone as if this is all perfectly normal. And Jinhyuk is apparently a father.

Wooseok reacts like anyone else probably would: eyes narrowed in disbelief, the set of his shoulders tense with suspicion as if questioning whether Jinhyuk is playing an elaborate prank on him. But the truth is plain to see in the helpless shrug that Jinhyuk offers and the way his smile wavers as he gingerly cradles Jinwoo to his chest, his grip awkward but still gentle with good intentions.

“You’re kidding me, right?” Wooseok repeats flatly. He’s frozen in the process of removing his coat, the corduroy collar curling around his right bicep. “You’ve just – you – _a baby_. You’ve just gone and landed yourself with a freaking _baby_?”

There are a million and one ways Jinhyuk could respond to that, but for some reason he chooses a somewhat curt, “His name is Jinwoo.”

He can’t help it. Even though Wooseok’s only going through the same process he did just hours earlier, an instinctive defensiveness rises to the surface of his skin at his best friend’s unwelcoming tone. At the way he doesn’t melt at the sight of Jinwoo resting his head on the junction between Jinhyuk’s neck and shoulder and instead chooses to remain stoic in the face of a child for the first time in his life. Wooseok meets his rebuke with a scowl.

“Yes, and _Jinwoo_ happens to be a baby,” he says waspishly. “An actual human being, Jinhyuk. How the fuck are you meant to bring up an actual human being? God, have you even thought about what any of that actually means?”

Truthfully? No, he hasn’t.

All he could think about at the time was how Goeun made it clear that Jinwoo was either finding a home with Jinhyuk or entering one of Korea’s fine selection of orphanages since there’s no one else to take him in and how Jinhyuk just _couldn’t_ let that happen. His own flesh and blood living as a faceless boarder in some orphanage in Seoul while he prances around knowing full well that he could’ve taken him in? Could’ve stepped up and accepted the responsibility? It goes against everything he knows.

“Well, I couldn’t just say no,” he says helplessly. “She was going to give him to an orphanage. I couldn’t let him grow up like that, not when I could’ve done something. He’s my responsibility.”

“And not fucking Park Goeun’s?”

His voice is sharp, almost unforgiving. Wooseok has never been fond of Goeun, always said that she sounded like too much of a wild card from Jinhyuk’s stories about work. It’s clear that his distaste has now plummeted into flat-out contempt. He sweeps his eyes across the bags that still lie on the floor of their apartment with a derisive scoff.

“Let me get this straight. She turns up after a year with a son you didn’t know existed – don’t even know is _yours,_ let’s be honest – and tells you that she can’t give up her lifestyle to be a mother, so you need to be the one to take over. Not once did she tell you about the fact that she was pregnant – in fact, she probably didn’t even send you a _single_ text about _anything_ since she left your office! But she just expects it to be okay for her to waltz into our apartment and dump the kid on you? And of _course_ , you just let her do it because that’s just the kind of shit you let people get away with. Did you even bother arguing with her?”

The more Wooseok rants, the more Jinhyuk curls in on himself. It’s not like anything he’s saying is a lie – and isn’t that just the thing? All of Wooseok’s words, harsh though they are, are nothing but the blatant truth. Goeun hid Jinwoo from him until she saw fit to introduce him to Jinhyuk, shaking up his life like a little girl with a snow globe – gone long before the flakes even settled. And Jinhyuk _did_ just let it all happen.

But none of that captures what’s most important.

Jinhyuk licks his lips nervously. “He’s my son, Wooseok,” he whispers. “My kid.”

His best friend doesn’t say anything, doesn’t even move an inch. He merely meets his helpless gaze with two impassive eyes before he shakes his head and mutters, “I need some time to think.”

He pulls his coat back over his shoulders and, without so much as a glance back, leaves through the door he came through just minutes before. Jinhyuk watches him go, feeling cold. The shock from earlier has started to subside now, replaced with a weight in his stomach that makes his shoulders droop, already exhausted. He looks down at Jinwoo, who has been content to silently watch him all this time with a little fist in his mouth, and attempts a smile for the boy.

“Just you and me, eh, little man?” he says, voice shaking. “Just you and Appa.”

Jinwoo blinks up at him, so completely unaware of his situation before his mouth widens in a gummy smile.

The sight makes Jinhyuk laugh a little, a desperate sort of laugh that teeters on the edge of hysterical tears, that shakes and dips with tremors, unable to sustain itself. He forces himself to keep smiling, swallowing back the lump in his throat because he’ll be damned if he throws himself a pity party when it’s Jinwoo who’s lost someone today.

No, now is not the time to feel sorry about himself. Sure, Jinhyuk has just had his life thrown completely off-course and yes, his best friend has just walked out of the apartment in his fury, but there’ll be time to linger on that later. Right now, Jinhyuk needs to plan. He needs to figure out his immediate steps from here and then he can figure out the rest somewhere down the line.

He’ll need to call his mother, of course, and notify her of the news. She’ll probably rip him a new one for his carelessness, but he knows he can rely on her to help him with getting to grips on how to take care of a baby once she’s done raging at him. She’ll probably let him move back into his old room too, at least until he can find his feet since it’s not like he can live with Wooseok anymore. A baby is not in their roommate agreement and he can’t exactly force one onto the other man just because he pays half of the rent. Besides, the amount he’ll save on those bills will be helpful too, can go towards Jinwoo’s expenses since he’ll have to take some time off work to take care of him.

Okay. Okay. He can do this. He can think of this development logically and with a clear mind. There’s no time to panic when he’s busy listing out a to-do list in his head. No reason to do so when he has Goeun’s parenting books (“They didn’t help me much, but I figure you might get some use out of them,” she said with a shrug) and his trusty Naver app on hand to help him through being a good dad. He can do this.

He can do this.

He can’t do this.

It’s nearing two o’clock in the morning and Jinwoo hasn’t stopped crying for an hour. Which means that Jinhyuk, who has been rocking him and singing every song he can think of into his ear, is also close to crying for an hour. He adjusts his arms as they threaten to lose all feeling in them, trying not to wince when it means that Jinwoo’s next wail shoots right down his ear canal, and clumsily rubs circles onto his back.

“There, there, Jinwoo-ah,” he says, desperately trying to hush him. “It’s okay, Appa’s here. Appa’s right here.”

But it’s not Appa who Jinwoo wants. He hasn’t known Jinhyuk for more than a handful of hours by this point. The kid wants his mother, the woman who’s all he’s ever known in his short life. The thought of how distressed the baby must be makes Jinhyuk’s aching heart cry out and ignites a spark of rage deep in his chest.

Really, what the fuck is _wrong_ with Goeun? If she suspected that she wasn’t ready for the demands of being a mother, why go through with the pregnancy at all? It’s not like she was in a hurry to keep Jinhyuk informed about any of it in the first place so he wouldn’t have been any the wiser either way. Instead, she just left Jinwoo on his doorstep without a second’s thought, off to the next plane out of Seoul, completely upheaving everyone’s lives in the process. Jinwoo never asked for this.

Jinhyuk looks down at the distraught baby in his arms and presses a kiss to his hair.

“I’m so sorry, Jinwoo-ah,” he whispers, a lump in his throat. “I know I’m not the one you want, baby. I’m so, so sorry this has happened to you.”

Despite his best intentions, a tear slips down his cheek. He sniffs and tips his head back, trying to blink its brothers away before he ends up sobbing hysterically into his son – and that’s when he hears a _bang_ from the living room, followed by a loud and familiar curse.

He emerges from his bedroom to find Wooseok sprawled on the floor beside their coffee table, rubbing his shin with a grimace.

“Wooseokie?” he says, confused. He didn’t even hear him come in.

The man in question sits up at the sound of his voice and squints over at him. “Jinwoo keeping you up?” he asks, none of the iciness from earlier present in his tone. The question is offhand, the way one might remark about tomorrow’s weather forecast.

As if spurred on by Wooseok’s comment, Jinwoo howls louder. Jinhyuk winces, adjusting him so that his mouth isn’t as close to his eardrums.

“Has been for the past hour or so. I can’t put him back to sleep.” He tacks on what he’s really wondering and that’s, “What are you even doing?”

“Baby-proofing the apartment,” he says distractedly before adding, “When was the last time you fed him? He might be hungry.”

“I – _what?”_

“Milk, Jinhyuk. Babies drink it.”

“I don’t know, a few hours ago?” he says. He’s honestly been so out of it today that his grasp on the passage of time has been tenuous at best. He tentatively places his index finger near Jinwoo’s mouth and watches how his rosebud lips wrap around it, sucking hard. “Oh.”

“Jesus Christ,” Wooseok sighs, rising to his feet. “I’ll prepare his bottle.”

He drops a piece of clear silicone onto the table on his way to the kitchen; Jinhyuk recognises it as a corner guard used to soften the edges of sharp furniture. The sight of it only confuses him more and he follows Wooseok, questions on his tongue. Questions about why Wooseok seems so calm when he was stiff with rage mere hours before. Why he’s sticking corner guards onto their furniture in the middle of the night. Why he’s so at ease while putting together a bottle of milk for Jinwoo. There are probably more eloquent ways he can put it, but what slips out of his mouth is:

“What’s gotten into you?”

Wooseok blinks at him as he refastens the plastic lid of the formula container. “What do you mean? Jinwoo needs milk. I’m making that milk.”

“No, not that – I mean, it’s sort of that, but that’s not the way I meant it. I meant how come you’re acting so… weird about this? Two seconds ago, you were storming out of the apartment and now you’re heating up some milk for Jinwoo and baby-proofing the apartment. You’ve done a complete 180.”

Guilt settles on Wooseok’s handsome features, curling his pursed mouth downwards. He avoids his eyes and starts to fiddle with the formula box.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” he admits. “It was selfish of me. You’ve just found out that you have a son, I should be supporting you instead of blowing up like that. I mean, your entire life’s just about gone upside down, I should be here to help you out, right? Not to make it all about me.”

“You weren’t making it all about you,” Jinhyuk disagrees, but Wooseok only scoffs. He meets his eyes with a rueful look.

“Don’t do that. Don’t be so – _you_ and understand where I was coming from. It’ll only make me feel worse.”

“But I do understand where you’re coming from,” he insists. It’s a little awkward and inconvenient to have this conversation over Jinwoo’s constant wailing, but he storms ahead anyway. “It’s not fair of me to just bring a baby into the apartment without giving you a heads-up – but don’t worry, I’ll be calling my mother first thing tomorrow morning and we’ll be out of your hair soon enough so – “

“What are you on about?” Wooseok says sharply. “Why would you be out of my hair?”

“I mean… it’s not like I can just expect you to live here while I’m raising a kid, what else am I meant to do? My parents can give me a place to stay while I find my feet and help me with this whole parenting shtick while I’m at it.”

“Or you can stay here,” he says. His tone is hard, almost unforgiving, as if what Jinhyuk says borders on heresy. He circles around the table to approach him, lips pressed together in a flat frown. “Is this not your apartment too? Why would you have to leave your own home just because you have a kid now?”

Jinhyuk can only stare at him, bewildered to the point of silence. The bullet-point to-do list in his head begins to unravel as Wooseok dismisses his plans by bulldozing his way into Jinhyuk’s life as per usual. He’s done it ever since they were children and today is no different, his whims crumbling Jinhyuk’s resolutions into the wind without a care.

“Besides,” Wooseok says after a moment, plucking Jinwoo from his grasp with an ease Jinhyuk wishes he had, “you know how much I love kids.”

Raising a baby is hard.

 _Yeah, no shit_ , Jinhyuk thinks, but the realisation is jarring all the same. He’s always been fond of kids, loves taking on the big brother role and having his dongsaengs gaze up at him all cute and starry-eyed. But being a caring hyung is very different to being a father and the latter is something he can’t just take a break from whenever the young ones aren’t around. Jinwoo is only three months old and commands all of his attention. As much as he comes to love him – and he _does_ love him, a love with an intensity that sometimes scares him – it’s a tiring role to fill.

He doesn’t know what he’d do without Wooseok and his mother.

Just as he’d predicted, his mother spends half an hour ripping him apart on the phone when he breaks the news to her, appalled at how irresponsible her son has been, but then makes arrangements to stay over for the first two weeks of his fatherhood immediately after. Her presence eases the transition since it means he has someone to fall back on when he doesn’t know how to calm Jinwoo down or when he just needs a moment to breathe without stressing out about everything he has on his plate.

She wakes up early to clean the apartment and to cook them breakfast, stating that she’s just easing the load whenever Wooseok or Jinhyuk protest at all the work she’s doing. She buys Jinwoo clothes to wear in the future and fawns over the ones she dresses him in now, capturing his looks in half a hundred pictures on her phone. She teaches them all of her tricks from when she was raising Jinhyuk twenty six years prior and leads them through their mistakes patiently.

Jinhyuk is ashamed to note that he seems to be the one making them more frequently. When it comes to the more technical aspects of parenting – changing nappies, for example, or preparing Jinwoo’s formula – he feels like a lumbering giant, clumsy and inexpert. Whereas Wooseok takes to those things like a fish in water, not even fazed when Jinwoo vomits all over his shoulder when being burped. He has a knack for the tricky parts of parenthood.

Feeling guilty about how much he lacks, Jinhyuk tries to make up for it other ways. He speaks to Jinwoo frequently since he read that it’s important for a child’s development to hear proper vocabulary, often narrating what he’s doing around the apartment while his son tracks him, enraptured. He lies beside him during tummy time, encouraging him on with a wide grin and cheers whenever Jinwoo improves just the slightest. He takes care to bathe him properly and then peppers kisses all over him, delighting in the way Jinwoo grins up at him from underneath the towel.

Really, those are the moments that make it all worth it.

Yes, being a father is exhausting and the adjustment to his new full-time job isn’t easy by any means. But Jinwoo is such an adorable little baby, his cheeks round and his belly pudgy. His smile comes easier to him than his cries and the sight never fails to flood Jinhyuk with a wave of warmth. In just a matter of weeks, he comes to love Jinwoo more than anyone else in his life. He can’t ever imagine giving this up.

“Wooseokie is at work today,” he tells his son as he washes the dirty dishes in the sink.

He asked Wooseok to do it the previous evening, but the man must’ve forgotten in his exhaustion. Taking heed of the argument they had just two days after Jinhyuk’s mother left – one where he blew up at Wooseok for not cleaning up after himself, to which Wooseok fired back that he was a little busy cutting Jinwoo’s nails and taking care of Jinhyuk’s son since _someone_ was too scared to do it – he chooses not to press him on the issue. He can handle quietly cleaning up after Wooseok after all he’s done for him.

“He’s an illustrator, did you know? He draws pictures for children’s books. When you’re older, we’ll read some of them together and you can see them for yourself. You won’t believe how pretty they are, Jinwoo-ah, he’s so talented. I can only dream of drawing half as well.”

Jinwoo gurgles in reply from where he’s strapped in his baby bouncer.

He glances over at him with a wry smile. “You too, huh?”

Clueless and all the cuter for it, Jinwoo only smiles. His mouth is wet with drool, glistening in the sunlight from the windows, and Jinhyuk tuts under his breath, swooping over to wipe it with his bib. He’s read that it’s normal for babies to drool a lot at this age as their salivary reflexes start to kick in, but part of him can’t help but find it icky. Jinwoo doesn’t seem to agree, making a dismissive noise as he turns his head away from the bib.

“Fine, my little drool-loving chunk,” Jinhyuk sighs in defeat, pressing a kiss to his forehead. “Stay as messy as you like. See if I care.” When Jinwoo coos, he rolls his eyes. “Yes, of course you’d be happy about that. Why am I not surprised?”

He pokes his tummy playfully and grins as Jinwoo kicks his legs out at him, babbling with joy. Jinhyuk snatches up his feet and presses a kiss to them.

The sound of the front door opening echoes through the apartment as Wooseok returns and calls out Jinhyuk’s name inquisitively. Still fawning over his child, he shouts back that he’s in the kitchen with Jinwoo without making to move into view. Moments later, Wooseok strolls into the room, dumping a bag of groceries onto the counter as he makes a beeline for the baby.

“Hello, Jinwoo-ah,” he says, his voice sugary sweet as he drops a kiss to both of his cheeks. He then glances up at Jinhyuk. “Hey, loser. You have a huge wet patch on your t-shirt.”

Jinhyuk glances down at his torso and confirms that he does indeed have a wet patch on his t-shirt. He shrugs. “I was washing up. How was your meeting?”

“It was alright. The author’s given me a lot of creative control aside from some defining features and she seemed to like the ideas I was playing around with so I think this will be a good deal. Fingers crossed I can whip up something that’ll impress her.”

“When have you ever not?” Jinhyuk replies, drifting over to the groceries to unpack them.

“You’d be surprised,” Wooseok grimaces. “By the way, I ran into Seungyoun at the supermarket. He literally followed me around to bug me about coming over to see Jinwoo this Saturday. Says he has a bunch of gifts to solidify himself as the cool uncle. You okay with that?”

Jinhyuk’s not even surprised by the news. It sounds like something Seungyoun would do. Ever since Jinhyuk broke the news on the group chat – and his friends finally realised that he wasn’t trying to pull their legs, thanks to Wooseok opening the chat for the first time in months to confirm the revelation – Seungyoun has been over the moon. He’s kept his distance to let Jinhyuk settle into assimilating Jinwoo into his life, but to make up for that distance, he replies to all of Jinhyuk’s snaps of Jinwoo with a million hearts, exclamation marks and that one sobbing emoji.

“Sure, why not?” Jinhyuk shrugs. “We can invite all the guys, make it Jinwoo’s official introduction to the group.”

Wooseok smirks. “Just going to drop him in the deep end like that, are we? How cruel of you to treat the poor kid like that.”

“He’ll be _fine_. He’s made of strong stuff. Like his Appa.”

For some reason, his comment colours Wooseok’s smirk a foreboding shade of sinister. He looks over at him, eyes slanted and studious.

“Strong stuff?” he echoes. “You sure about that?”

Twenty years of friendship means that he knows what Wooseok’s about to do seconds before it happens. Crying out for him to stay back, Jinhyuk stumbles away, arms flung out in front of him, but it’s no use: Wooseok pounces all the same, like a cat that’s just spotted a particularly juicy canary. Jinhyuk lets out a defensive yell, hands held aloft in a cross to protect his head from the assault. But Wooseok, annoyingly nimble when he chooses to be, manages to curl himself around him in a way that puts him in prime position to wrestle Jinhyuk into a headlock.

“Ah, _so_ strong, my Jinhyukie,” he coos condescendingly as Jinhyuk bucks under his hold. “So capable and able to hold his own. How _admirable._ ”

“ _Wooseok_ , you little rat – “

“Jinwoo has a lot to live up to,” he continues. “It’s like trying to compete with the reputation of a legend like Rocky Balboa.”

He swears his spine is about to break from how much he’s forced to bend over – damn Wooseok and his annoyingly short stature. The man’s going to snap him in half. Struggling desperately, he does the only thing that comes to mind and manages to jab a finger into Wooseok’s side, right where it hurts the most. When he jerks at the prod, Jinhyuk takes the opportunity to reach over his torso and tickle under his arm. Laughing, Wooseok tears himself away.

“That was a low blow,” he informs Jinhyuk, though a smile is still scratched upon his lips. “You never bring tickles into a fight.”

“You had me in a headlock,” he throws back.

Wooseok jeers, “I thought you were strong stuff.”

“Seriously? That’s what you’re going with?” Jinhyuk shakes his head in disbelief. “We’re twenty six and you still act like a child.”

“You mean, _you’re_ twenty six, old man. _I’m_ still twenty five and in the prime of my youth.”

Jinhyuk’s mouth falls open as he sucks in an offended gasp. “I’m not old! I’m only four months older than you.”

“And yet you wear the age so much worse.”

If it’s possible, his jaw drops even more. The _audacity_ of such a statement. He knows Wooseok’s only teasing him, aiming to get a rise out of him because it’s what he does – but falling in line with those expectations is what _Jinhyuk_ does. He can already feel himself getting ready to fire back with his own comment, prepared to dissolve into a bickering match for the next five minutes, one which he fully intends to emerge victorious from.

At least until he hears the unmistakeable sound of a giggle.

For a moment, he doesn’t compute the noise properly, just blinks at Wooseok and wonders wildly how he managed to laugh with his mouth closed. Wooseok returns the stare, just as taken aback, and then they simultaneously pivot to look at Jinwoo.

“Did he just – “ Wooseok begins.

Jinhyuk slowly nods. “I think he did.” Then, the realisation hits him with the force of a roundhouse kick to the chest. “ _Oh my god,_ he did! My son just laughed for the first time!”

With a yelp that reaches an ungodly pitch, Jinhyuk throws himself across the kitchen to where Jinwoo sits, hands fawning over his fluffy cheeks. Jinwoo’s smile grows under the attention, uninhibited in his cheer, and he gurgles another laugh. It’s a short staccato in the way of most babies’ laughs, each note that hits the air sweet to the senses. Heart bursting with joy, Jinhyuk peppers kisses all over his face as a reward.

“Ah, my little Jinwoo-ah’s laughing,” he exclaims. Aegyo drips from his words when he adds, “Are you happy, Jinwoo-ah? Is my little man happy? You have such a cute little laugh, my sweetheart, it might be Appa’s favourite sound in the world now.”

He glances over at Wooseok, grinning as if to say ‘ _have you seen this?’_ , only to find the other man filming them with his phone. He lowers it slightly to raise his eyebrows.

“Don’t stop on my account. I’m just capturing all of Jinwoo’s firsts. Go on, make him laugh again.”

Jinhyuk eyes him suspiciously. “You’re going to use my aegyo against me, aren’t you?”

“I resent that accusation,” he says. “Even if it’s true.”

“Yah, Kim Wooseok!”

Wooseok rolls his eyes. “Don’t act like you’re not used to it. Now make Jinwoo laugh again, I want it on camera.” He snaps his fingers impatiently.

Deciding there’s no point in fighting what will only be a losing battle – and besides, Wooseok has collected and curated plenty of embarrassing memories of him over the years so one more won’t hurt – he turns back to Jinwoo, eyes crinkled in a smile. Who cares if he’s embarrassing? So long as Jinwoo’s happy, he can live with that.

Eventually, the time comes when Jinhyuk has to return to full-time work again. He’s usually great about clocking in since he’s lucky enough to be in a job he loves and so has racked up enough unused days off to extend his paternity leave until he was more comfortable taking care of Jinwoo. But unfortunately taking care of Jinwoo is an expensive process that requires money and he can only get that money by returning to The Workforce.

So one day, Jinhyuk wakes early in the morning and hops in the shower straight away instead of stumbling into the kitchen to heat up some milk for Jinwoo. He pulls on his work clothes – nothing too fancy since the video games company he works at is pretty lax on business attire – and eats his cereal while Wooseok feeds Jinwoo. And then before he knows it, he’s pulling on his shoes at the door, ready to leave.

As he reaches for the door, a strange tight sensation seizes his chest. Jinhyuk shifts, inexplicably uneasy before he turns round and strides back into the kitchen.

“I haven’t kissed Jinwoo goodbye yet,” he explains hastily when Wooseok squints up at him blearily in silent inquisition.

Wooseok shifts so that he can access Jinwoo better. Jinhyuk crouches down beside them and ducks his head close to his son, murmuring a soft goodbye before he presses his lips against Jinwoo’s cheek in a firm kiss. Too preoccupied with his milk, Jinwoo impatiently turns his head so he can continue to drink in peace, and something in Jinhyuk’s heart shatters.

He’s _so young_ , he thinks. Too young to know or care that this is the first time they’re going to be apart for this long since Goeun first dropped Jinwoo off weeks beforehand. Meanwhile, Jinhyuk’s a complete wreck inside. He pastes on an easy smile nonetheless, a thumb rubbing the smooth flesh of Jinwoo’s cheek in affection.

“Make sure you do some tummy time with him,” he says to Wooseok. “And talk to him when you’re doing things, it’s good for him and he likes to hear the sound of someone else’s voice.”

“Will do,” Wooseok reassures.

“You don’t need to give him a bath because I can do that when I’m back – unless he spills something on himself or gets really dirty, of course. And make sure you read him a fairytale from my book, we’ve been going through that together.”

“No bath, read a fairytale. Got it.”

“And make sure you – “

“Jinhyuk, I’ve got it,” Wooseok cuts him off firmly. When Jinhyuk glances up at him, he’s looking down at him with an understanding smile if a little exasperated. He tucks Jinwoo closer to him and says, “I know how to take care of him. Been doing it just as long as you.”

“I know, but…”

“But you’re worried. I get it. You don’t want to leave him and go to work.”

He doesn’t know whether he should feel embarrassed that he’s so easily figured out. His ears make the decision for him, flaming red at the tips as he sheepishly drops his eyes to Wooseok’s lap – where Jinwoo’s tiny little feet rest – to avoid the pity that’ll surely enter his best friend’s face any second now.

“I just… He’s so small,” he says feebly. “And I won’t be here to protect him.”

“But I will,” Wooseok says gently, though his tone is also resolute. With a little manoeuvring, he frees a hand to card it through Jinhyuk’s hair in a rare comforting gesture. His nails scratch his scalp soothingly so that Jinhyuk finds himself relaxing into the touch despite his worries. “I promise you Jinwoo will be okay with me. And you’ll be okay without him too. And you’ll come back in a few hours to find some bulgogi on the kitchen table and this little man waiting for you in his bouncer and the world won’t have exploded. Okay?”

Jinhyuk bites his lip, still uncertain. When Wooseok tugs lightly at his hair at the lack of response, he offers a reluctant _okay_ and slowly clambers to his feet.

“I guess I’m going now.”

Wooseok bats his eyelashes, looking as pretty as a daisy despite the early hour. “What? No kiss for me?”

Just for that, Jinhyuk plants a sloppy kiss on the top of his head, letting out a hearty laugh at the way Wooseok responds with an offended exclamation and kicks him away for actually taking him up on the offer. He shoos Jinhyuk out of the kitchen, pointing out the time and how he’ll most certainly end up late if he doesn’t get a move on right this instance. Even if he wants to linger by Jinwoo for at least another half hour – and oh _boy_ , does he want to – Jinhyuk can’t really afford that so he rushes for the door and begins the first day of the routine of the rest of his life.

He makes it to work with a couple of minutes to spare, throwing out a warm greeting to Yoojung at the reception as he hurries past.

When he reaches his desk, it’s to a huge sparkly sign taped to the monitor of his computer screen, pink gel pen exclaiming _WELCOME BACK!!!_ in the confines of a fat, lopsided heart. Underneath it is a bottle of expensive lemonade and a chocolate cupcake with a generous topping of sprinkles.

Smiling softly, Jinhyuk reaches for the sign and peels it free, moving it to the translucent divider that separates him from his co-worker Minsoo.

“So,” Minsoo says, popping his head round, “how’s the kid?”

It’s clear from the gleam in his eyes that the news of Jinhyuk’s newfound fatherhood has been the latest fodder for the gossip cannon at work and Minsoo is eager to add some more to their stash. But Minsoo is also someone Jinhyuk really gets along with, so he doesn’t mind much.

“He’s doing well,” he replies before smiling sadly. “Wooseok was feeding him when I left so he didn’t really notice me leaving. I already miss him.”

Minsoo nods with understanding. “That makes sense. One of my aunts had a baby a few years ago and I remember that she had pretty bad separation anxiety for the first six months as well. I’ve heard it’s common in new parents.”

_Separation anxiety._

The term slots into place in his mind, somehow gathering up the messy tangle of feelings in his chest and shoving them into one neat little definition. That’s what he feels at the thought of having to leave Jinwoo home alone – or rather, without him there. Even if he knows Wooseok can take care of him just fine, the fact that Jinhyuk can’t be there to confirm it for himself has him uneasy. It explains the itch in his fingers and the way his stomach can’t stop churning.

Unable to help himself, he reaches for his phone to text Wooseok for an update on Jinwoo, only to find that he has already beat him to the chase. He’s sent a selfie of him with Jinwoo, their cheeks pressed together, and captioned it with _our good little baby drank all of his milk! not much vomit either when i burped him this morning so hopefully he’ll keep up the good behaviour ^.^_

Jinhyuk can’t help but ask: _did he cry yet??_

A reply arrives instantly. _nope not yet. i’ll text you when he does._

“So you’re raising him with Wooseok then,” says Minsoo, interrupting his thoughts. His eyes are trained on the picture on Jinhyuk’s phone. “I was wondering what he must think about all of this.”

“Uh, yeah,” Jinhyuk says, his ears tinged red. “I guess I am.”

It sounds weird when it’s put like that. That he’s raising a kid with Wooseok. After all, Jinwoo is Jinhyuk’s son; legally speaking, he’s only Jinhyuk’s responsibility.

But Wooseok feeds him and sings him to sleep and handwashes all of the baby-grows Jinwoo vomits over with nothing more than another softly-sung song. He pays towards buying Jinwoo’s nappies and his baby formula, rubs antiseptic cream onto his little bum whenever it’s red and weighs him every day.

 _Our good little baby drank all of his milk_ , he said.

Our good little baby. Not yours, not the. Ours.

A little before he turns seven months old, Jinwoo starts teething. The experience has him crabbier than usual and it’s not uncommon for him to suddenly start gnawing on whoever’s finger he has trapped in his chubby little fist. The sensation is weird and ticklish, but Jinhyuk has become accustomed to all of the fluids that are involved when raising a baby so he doesn’t pay much attention to the saliva on his skin. He also invests in a bunch of safe teething toys for Jinwoo to soothe himself with whenever he’s not being held.

Raising a baby is still hard, but Jinhyuk is getting better at it.

Now that he’s a little older, Jinwoo has started sleeping through the night more often. Actually, he likes to sleep longer than he should which results in either Wooseok or Jinhyuk having to force him awake to feed. Their favourite tactic is to tickle his feet because Jinwoo’s frown whenever it pulls him out of sleep is too adorable for words.

So many things have changed in the past four months. Jinhyuk has gone from being the average video game programmer, nerdy and too gangly for his own good, to a father who likes to stay home most Friday nights. And Wooseok is right next to him on all of those Friday nights, curled up like a cat in his pyjamas with his glasses balancing on his nose, a cup of hot chocolate nestling in the cradle of his hands.

Their days are now measured in Jinwoo. Jinhyuk can’t picture a life where they don’t revolve around his son and his memories of one are distant and muted with all the haziness of a dream that was too surreal to keep hold of. Gone before he even brushed his teeth after waking in the morning, what fragments remain gathering dust with the cobwebs in the back of his mind. He prefers it that way.

Everyone is different, he knows this. Some people just don’t have it in them to raise children.

But whenever he looks at Jinwoo, he can’t help but wonder what on earth must’ve possessed Goeun to be able to give this all up. Because now that he has him, Jinhyuk thinks he would fight the world to keep Jinwoo by his side.

Somewhere along the way, Wooseok moves into Jinhyuk’s bedroom.

It begins as an accident. Jinwoo has colic and the pain has him crying all night, unable to settle properly, so Wooseok stays in the room as they take turns to soothe the baby while the other person catches some sleep. When Jinwoo finally quietens down into a deep enough sleep, Wooseok is too tired to go anywhere.

So he doesn’t.

When Jinhyuk’s alarm goes off that morning and his hand shoots out to silence it before it can rouse Jinwoo, he finds an arm hooked over his waist. As he regains consciousness, he then becomes aware of the rest of Wooseok’s body: the forehead pressed against Jinhyuk’s spine, the way Wooseok’s legs are angled to shadow his, the rise and fall of his chest. They don’t tend to cuddle like this since Wooseok claims he’s allergic to physical contact and it’s even rarer for them to share a bed since he often sleeps in the centre of them with his arms spread out like a starfish. But they did last night and they are right now and it feels nice. Cosy.

So Jinhyuk doesn’t mind when it happens again.

And again.

And again. Until several days have passed and every time Wooseok’s head has hit a pillow has been in Jinhyuk’s bed. Until his stuff slowly starts to find its way into Jinhyuk’s room: his charger and the book he’s reading before he turns out the light and his night creams. His laundry sits at the foot of Jinhyuk’s bed until one of them folds it away and his coffee cups line the windowsill and his glasses have a designated place on their bedside table. His sketchpad sits underneath them and his pencils always end up rolling underneath the bed until one of them scrabbles to get them out, the torch of their phone illuminating the dust bunnies on the carpet, and he kicks off his socks next to Jinwoo’s cot every single night.

And when Wooseok yawns in the evening and suggests, “Let’s go to bed,” he never heads into his old bedroom. Somewhere along the way, it became just another spare bit of space to keep his clothes and Jinwoo’s things in.

They always go to Jinhyuk’s.

Though they don’t discuss it, it’s not just for convenience’s sake that Wooseok moves into Jinhyuk’s bedroom. The other reason lingers unspoken in their actions. The way Jinhyuk throws an arm over Wooseok before he closes his eyes for the day, the way Wooseok will slide into his embrace after popping to the toilet in the middle of the night. They cling onto each other whenever they’re exhausted, seeking the comfort of each other’s solidness.

Life has been full of changes in the past year and this is just another one of them.

But they don’t discuss it, content to let the situation be whatever it is.

That is, until –

“Jinhyuk sunbaenim!” calls out a familiar voice. Its owner comes up to tap his elbow in greeting and then bow his head. “Fancy seeing you here.”

Jinhyuk turns from the cucumbers he’s inspecting with a warm but rebuking smile. “Sejin, how many times do I have to tell you that you can drop the honorifics when we’re outside of the office? We’re the same age, let’s talk comfortably, yeah?”

Sejin chuckles, a pink tinge of embarrassment to his cheeks. “I can’t help it. You’re my superior and I’m just an intern, I have to be respectful to you. It takes me a little while to slip back out of it.”

Jinhyuk replies with another smile, this time to say it’s okay. The two of them fall into conversation, simply sharing what each other’s weekend has been like so far and what brings them here. For Sejin, it’s nothing but his weekly grocery shop, but Jinhyuk is here in search of ingredients for a small get-together he has planned for the upcoming Wednesday. According to the birth certificate Goeun provided him with all those months ago, Jinwoo is turning one years old this week and he wants to celebrate it proudly.

“I can’t believe he’s turning one already,” says Sejin.

“Me neither. He’s grown so quickly these past few months, it’s like I’ve blinked and he’s already twice his size. Not going to lie, I think I’m going to cry on the day. I’m not ready for him to grow up.”

“It has to happen eventually,” he comforts, placing a hand on his arm. He squeezes gently. “And you have so much more to look forward to when he does. Like his first words and his first steps and his first – “

“Sorry to interrupt,” says a cool voice that doesn’t sound sorry in the slightest. “I’ve finally found the cream cheese, Jinhyuk. There was none on the shelf so I had a worker go and get me some from the back. Have you gotten everything we need from this aisle then?”

Jinhyuk turns to face Wooseok with a sheepish grin. “Uh, sort of? I was looking at the cucumbers, trying to figure out which one is in the best condition when I ran into Sejin here. Oh! Uh, Wooseok meet Sejin, he’s an intern from work and a friend. Sejin, meet Wooseok. He’s my best friend.” He gestures between the two.

Sejin offers up his politest greeting, the corners of his mouth pulled up in a smile. If he’s expecting it to be received well, it isn’t – all Wooseok does is return the gesture with an impassive stare, one eyebrow quirked up slightly. It should be ridiculous how unapproachable he appears, especially with a round-faced, babbling Jinwoo strapped to his chest, but it seems to effectively cow Sejin into silence. Wooseok’s eyes flicker to the hand that rests on Jinhyuk’s forearm and then back to Sejin.

“Pleasure,” he says coldly.

Jinhyuk blinks, his grin faltering.

“Wooseok has had a long day,” he says after an awkward pause. He shoots the other a glare that doesn’t seem to affect him in the slightest. “So please don’t mind him if he sounds a bit – off.”

“Oh, not at all,” Sejin says with a nervous laugh. He lifts his hand from Jinhyuk’s arm to run it through his hair and then curls it around the handle of his empty shopping basket. He twists it in between the three of them like a Tilt-a-Whirl. “I’ve been there before, I know how it is.”

Jinhyuk highly doubts that. Even at the ass-crack of dawn, Sejin is nothing but chipper and he never voices a complaint about having to do the grunt work in the office. There’s a reason why he’s endeared himself to the existing staff and will mostly likely be joining their roster once his three months are over. He’s _nice._

Wooseok isn’t.

At least, not when he doesn’t want to be.

“Is this little Jinwoo then?” Sejin says brightly, latching onto something that will dispel the tension from the air. He leans forward to coo over Jinwoo who responds with a toothy grin, mouth slick with drool. “Aww, he’s so cute. He must get it from his Appa. Look at that smile, it’s exactly like yours!”

He reaches out to poke Jinwoo’s cheek, only to have Wooseok step away with a frown. It has Sejin falter in both his approach and his smile.

“I’m sorry,” Wooseok says. Once again, he doesn’t sound very sorry at all. “I’m not comfortable with people I don’t know touching my son.”

Realisation dawns on Sejin. He looks from Wooseok’s overprotective hold on Jinwoo’s legs to Jinhyuk’s embarrassed flush and seems to arrive at a conclusion. Within moments, he excuses himself with an apology and a muttered farewell for Jinhyuk – a simple promise to see him at the office on Monday morning when Jinhyuk clocks into work – and scuttles away. Wooseok watches him go with a satisfied look that doesn’t fade when Jinhyuk rounds on him.

“What was that for?” he snaps. “Sejin’s a really nice guy and he’s my friend. Why would you treat him so rudely?”

Wooseok shrugs. The movement is so casual, it infuriates him. “I didn’t like the look of him. He fancies you.”

“No, he doesn’t,” Jinhyuk says automatically, only to have Wooseok raise an eyebrow at him, unimpressed.

“Yes, he does. I could see it from the other end of the aisle. He’s not very good at hiding it.”

Jinhyuk opens his mouth to refute this again, only for the protests to die in his throat. He thinks back to Minsoo’s sly looks whenever Sejin dropped off a cup of coffee for him from the break room, to the smirk that would flit across Hwanhee’s face when Jinhyuk complimented Sejin on his good work during their weekly meetings. A few of his co-workers have even asked him if he was interested in anyone else in the office recently; at the time, Jinhyuk brushed it off as them teasing him about Goeun once again, but perhaps he was wrong.

His eyes refocus in time to catch Wooseok’s smug and knowing expression.

“Whatever,” he blusters, ears red. His eyes shift away, unable to maintain their hold on Wooseok’s. “That’s not even important. Regardless of how Sejin may or may not feel for me, it was still rude of you to have talked to him like that. I don’t know what you even hoped to achieve with it, but – “

“Don’t you?” Wooseok interrupts.

Jinhyuk’s gaze snaps back to him in surprise. “I – what? What do you mean?”

“You said you don’t know why I spoke to Sejin like that.”

“I don’t.”

“But you do,” he says. He moves closer until he’s stood right in front of Jinhyuk. Until Jinwoo doesn’t even have to stretch out his legs to kick it against Jinhyuk’s chest and Wooseok has to crane his head back to uphold their shared stare. Something gleams in his eyes, sharp and knowing. “Or you will when you let yourself think about it. And I mean _really_ think about it.”

Jinhyuk can only gape at him, floundering.

Wooseok smirks and the curve of his mouth is nothing but amused. “Don’t strain yourself. We have plenty of time.”

With a wink, he turns on his heel and leads the way out of the aisle.

It happens after Jinwoo’s birthday party. After they unwrap his presents for him, several of which come from certified rich and cool Uncle Seungyoun, and after Seungwoo belts out the birthday song no less then ten times in a strong falsetto and after Hangyul accidentally drops a slice of cake onto his lap when Yohan cracks a joke that has him laughing for ten minutes straight. They’ve already tucked a sleeping Jinwoo into his cot and are quietly tidying up the remnants of the birthday party. Wooseok is hoovering up the confetti on the floor and Jinhyuk is wiping down the coffee table and everything is just peaceful and domestic and –

“Are you in love with me?”

The question leaves his mouth before he gives it permission to.

Wooseok’s eyebrows hike up and he flicks the green switch of the hoover. Its splutters choke for air before they fade away and there’s only silence left. And it’s just Wooseok and Jinhyuk staring at each other from opposite sides of the living area, one person incredulous and the other beet-red and wishing the ground would just gape open and swallow him whole.

“That’s the way you’re going to go about it?” Wooseok asks flatly.

If possible, Jinhyuk reddens more. He manages to open his mouth, searching for something better before – “Yes.”

Another silence.

Then Wooseok rolls his eyes and laughs, one of his breathless ones where he doesn’t bother to raise a hand to shield the quirk of his lips and the glimpse of his teeth. It’s one of Jinhyuk’s favourite laughs, but he’s too flustered to admire it right now. Wooseok shakes his head, eyes dropping to the pipe of the hoover as he picks it up again, ready to resume his task.

“Yes, I’m in love with you,” he says, all nonchalant like he hasn’t just confessed to his best friend of over two decades. “Have been for a while now.”

Then he flicks the hoover back on and starts sucking up the rest of the confetti.

Jinhyuk can only watch him in bewilderment. Is it just him or is Wooseok unusually calm about this? Surely most people aren’t this dismissive when admitting to being in love with someone? Isn’t this all a little… understated?

“Is that it?” he asks blankly. “Is that all you’re going to say?”

“Yes,” Wooseok says, parroting Jinhyuk’s reply from earlier with a smirk.

“I – uh, should we not – is this not a little… Shouldn’t we _talk_ about this? Like. Properly talk about this, I mean?”

He shrugs. “Probably.”

“Well, then – don’t you want to stop hoovering so we can do that?”

“Nope.” He says the word like a pop of sound, lips smacking together. The pipe of the hoover pokes its head underneath the sofa and drags along the carpet, greedily sucking up all the dirt. “We need to get all of this cleaning done and then I need to go to bed because I’m tired. And then when I wake up tomorrow morning, you’ll have spent all the hours you need to digest the fact that I’m in love with you before you can admit to yourself that you’re in love with me too. And then by the time _you_ wake up, I’ll have made pancakes for us because I know you like them and you can tell me you love me when we’re eating them.”

Jinhyuk’s head feels like it’s going to explode. He remembers the numb shock he went into when Goeun turned up outside their apartment all those months ago and surprised him with a son she then dumped into his arms. Remembers how he scrambled to stamp down on his panic and figure out a plan on how to proceed from there, one that Wooseok ended up blowing right through like the hurricane he is. Even _that_ is nothing compared to this bombshell.

Because right now, he can’t even form a comprehensive thought, never mind try to keep himself calm with the firm but gentle reassurance of logic. He’s just speechless. Absolutely speechless.

“I’m in love with you?” he manages at last.

Wooseok looks over at him and there’s something gentle in his gaze. It makes Jinhyuk’s heart stumble in his chest just ever so slightly.

“You look at me like you are,” he says quietly. He drops his eyes, suddenly shy. “I hope you are.”

And the thing is –

Jinhyuk is.

Maybe he can’t process or admit it yet. Maybe it’s still a strange fact to accept, the knowledge that somewhere along the way – not just in the past year but over the many that have preceded it – he started to fall for Wooseok. Bit by bit until it spiralled with Goeun’s visit, when Jinhyuk was given a son and Jinwoo gained two fathers.

He fell in love with Wooseok over nappy rash and baby spittle, over sleepless nights when Jinwoo’s colic stopped him from settling down for his naps and over every little milestone that their baby has reached, forever immortalised on Wooseok’s camera roll. He fell in love with the spread of Wooseok’s fingers on Jinwoo’s back and the huskiness of his lullabies in the afternoon. He fell in love with the tears that lined Wooseok’s eyes when Jinwoo crawled into a table leg and cried out for him, arms stretched out, sobbing _Appa Appa Appa._

Many things have changed this past year and this is another one of them. He’s just a little slower to process it.

When Jinhyuk wakes up the next morning, it’s to the smell of pancakes. He turns his head, eyes immediately searching for Jinwoo, only to find his cot empty. Before panic can grip him, the sound of Jinwoo’s giggles rings out throughout the apartment and he hears Wooseok’s answering chuckle. They’re followed by the noisy smack of a wet kiss pressed to a cherub cheek.

Sleep has wiped away the fog from Jinhyuk’s mind. He gets out of bed, feeling calm and sure of himself.

When he enters the kitchen, it’s to find Wooseok feeding Jinwoo mashed banana. The spoon glides through the air before it gets to its destination, whooshing and swirling to the beat of Wooseok’s sound effects before it lands in a beaming Jinwoo’s mouth. Jinhyuk leans against the doorframe and watches them with a quiet smile until they notice him.

Wooseok’s eyes flicker to meet his. In the light of day, they seem much less certain, but he affects a cool expression and inclines his head towards a stack of pancakes on the countertop.

“There’s your breakfast. I made you quite a few pancakes and I expect you to eat them all up. God knows you could do with more meat on your bones.”

Jinhyuk grins and grabs his plate. He puts it down just to the right of Wooseok’s and then leans over to kiss him on the lips, soft and slow. Wooseok’s breath catches in his throat. When Jinhyuk pulls away, Wooseok mirrors his smile.

“Are you in love with me?” he asks, low and teasing.

Jinhyuk beams, his eyes crinkled up at the edges. “Yes, I’m in love with you. Have been for a while now.”

“Good,” Wooseok says, rubbing a thumb over Jinhyuk’s bottom lip. He presses a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “I hoped you were.”

**Author's Note:**

> i hope you enjoyed this! it's not my best work seeing as how i wrote like 6k words in a few hours, but i thought it deserved to be out there instead of just gathering dust in my laptop. as always don't be afraid to comment! i love talking to readers <33
> 
> [[twitter](https://twitter.com/thotforcsy)] | [[cc](https://curiouscat.me/jjasmine)]


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